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Where the Iron Horse meets the Carriage Horse |
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Paulden |
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| When we were considering retirement, we knew we would stay in Arizona, but where? After living in the low desert of Phoenix for 25 years, we were willing to give up warm winters and blazing summers for a location with more of a four season climate. In Arizona, that works well between the elevations of 4 and 5,000 feet. That search led us to the Prescott area. Prescott is one of the most pleasant locations in the state. Not only is it one of the oldest and architecturally historic communities in Arizona, much of the early 20th century character of its downtown has been retained. Nestled in a pine tree covered basin within the Bradshaw Mountains, Prescott enjoys four seasons, typically totaling a couple of feet of snow in the winter and summers rarely making it above the mid '90s. And for future retirees, it also is large enough to have complete medical facilities and more shopping opportunities than we would ever need. But what about Paulden? After living in Phoenix for fifteen years on the side of South Mountain, Mary Jane said that her next home would have flat land for her horses, hopefully with dirt rather than rocks to travel on. Fortunately, several carriage driving friends had already located in the Chino Valley portion of the Prescott area. Rather than being in the mountains, Chino Valley is located in the edge of the Big Chino basin, about fifteen miles north of Prescott. Focusing on that area, availability of land brought us another ten miles north to the unincorporated community of Paulden and an eventual purchase of 20 acres of delightfully flat to rolling land, made for horse and carriage driving. As an unexpected added bonus, the land we purchased happened to lie a mile north of the historic Santa Fe Peavine railroad line, running from Williams to Phoenix.
In Arizona there are considered
to be three topographic regions - the Mogollon Plateau in the northern
third of the state, which begins at an elevation of 5,000 feet and
tilts up to over 7,000 feet. Punctuating that plateau are
mountain ranges including the huge volcanic field near Flagstaff which
created the
mountains, the San Francisco Peaks. The Grand Canyon is cut into this plateau, and starting at 7,000 feet on the south rim it extends down to an elevation of 1,500 feet at the Colorado River. To the south and west are the low desert regions of the Sonoran Desert. Consisting of the Gila and Salt River drainage system, these low deserts contain much of what we think of when visualizing desert regions - rocky mountains, sandy plains, Saguaro or Prickly Pear cactus, rattlesnakes, etc. Phoenix and Tucson are located in the upper portions of the Sonoran Desert. Most of the remainder of Arizona consists of what is termed "mountains and basins". These consist of tall mountains, 7 to almost 10,000 feet in elevation punctuating adjacent broad, level valley basins. Starting to the west near the Colorado River, these basins may be at elevations of 1,500 feet while to the north or southeast they may be at 5,000 feet. Although technically all are desert, these high desert valleys look
dramatically different than their Sonoran Desert cousins. Historically they were occupied by tall native grasslands giving way to Juniper and Oak trees at about 5,000 feet. Higher in the mountains, these give way to tall Ponderosa Pine trees. Valleys are typically broad, level and surrounded by mountains, often rising several thousand feet above the valley floor. Streams and washes leading from the mountains frequently are defined by lines of Cottonwood or Willow trees, visible for many miles. The high desert valleys were ideal for early cattlemen and many of the original ranch settlements in Arizona, dating from the 1880's, were located in these valleys. Unfortunately, overgrazing and multi-year droughts at the turn of the twentieth century, led to the loss of the native grasses and undercutting of streambeds. Today we have only dryer vegetation and streams that flow only during rainy seasons. Paulden occupies the lower end of the Big Chino Valley, which is the headwaters for the Verde River, one of Arizona's major river systems. The Prescott area has been occupied since the 1860's by early prospectors who discovered gold in the Bradshaws. That let to the establishment of Ft. Whipple and the first territorial capitol of Arizona at Prescott. Soon thereafter early ranchers discovered lush grasslands in the valleys surrounding the Bradshaw Mountains, and some of the early ranches remain in operation to this day. Paulden was founded in the 1920's as a post office and the Midway Store serving ranches located in the Big Chino and Verde River valleys. It was named in honor of the son of the original Postmaster, Paul Pownall, who was killed in a hunting accident shortly after the family arrived in the area and for and Tom Dyden, another of the original Paulden settlers. Except for the mining settlement of Drake, the post office was the last one on the road north from Prescott until you reached the ATSF main line towns along old Route 66. Even today, Paulden is located on the southern edge of the Prescott and Kaibab National Forests which stretch north to the Grand Canyon and beyond. Visually it is defined by the Big Black Mesa on the north, one of the escarpments of the Mogollon Plateau.
Located on the original railroad line to Prescott, the town served local ranchers and a few residents for over sixty years. Then in the 1990's, growth in the Prescott area found people moving into this area to build homes in the hills or horse properties on the level ground. The 1500 people residing in Paulden in 1990 has grown to about 4000 today. Now, Paulden is home to a variety of people. Many live in modest manufactured housing on small lots created during Arizona's "land swindle" days of the 1950's and 1960's. Others live "back in the woods", some on patented lands in the National Forests, beyond the electric grid. Many, however, have built homes in the valley and surrounding hills and enjoy a true and quality rural lifestyle. The air remains clear and stars glitter in the nighttime sky. Traffic is usually only a neighbor who you know or a couple of kids riding their horses down the dirt roads. Getting groceries or going out to dinner usually means "going to town" in Chino Valley, ten miles south, or the "big city" of Prescott, 25 miles south. At an elevation of 4500 feet, Paulden occupies the lowest part of the Prescott area and enjoys the warmest days and ironically, sometimes the coldest nighttime temperatures. It snows
occasionally in the winter, but except for the "big ones" which don't seem to happen anymore, snow rarely lasts a day. If times were normal - that is if Arizona and the west were not locked into what looks like a two decade long drought - we would have 12 to 14 inches of rain a year. That is enough to bring a green spring with wildflowers and a summer monsoon to green up the grasses for the fall.
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LINKS Prescott Prescott Chamber Of Commerce Sedona Williams Grand Canyon Prescott National Forest Kaibab National Forest Little Thumb Butte B&B Gunsite
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tallest 
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Peter & Mary Jane Atonna
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